by N. M. Howell
“I don’t remember inviting you in,” she said, smirking.
“Well, I know you needed help bring in the heavy plate. Plus, I’m not a vampire.”
“Oh, can you even imagine living with vampires?”
“Absolutely not, I bet it was terrifying. I’m so glad they got wiped out. I don’t know which was worse: the mind controlling or the flying.”
“I vote mind control.”
“Yeah. But you know what, I’d have fun with that one.”
Andie laughed, glad of having made at least one friend. Nothing could ever truly take her mind off her father or the task ahead of her, and she definitely couldn’t be distracted from the danger, but Raesh was just the person she needed to meet on the first night. He was kind, friendly, welcoming, and in a way he reminded her of home. There was something about him that was patient, deliberate. She knew he liked her and he wasn’t shy of showing it, but he wasn’t pushing himself on her. He was sweet.
“You know even after the vampires, our parents’ generation faced terrible times,” he said, his smile fading into a grave expression. “They were all brave. They had to be.”
“You mean the terrorist attacks in Taline?”
“And the other thing. The Quelling.”
For a moment, Andie stopped breathing.
Not this. Any subject in the world but this. Something in her chest constricted, tightened beyond believing at the thought of what she’d lost and what her father had suffered. Even after eighteen years, it still hurt. There were a lot of things about her family before the Quelling that she had forgotten, but she could never forget the night itself. Never.
“I- I don’t even know how to ask this,” Raesh began. “I don’t even know if I should, but looking at you now, I think I have to. I’ve heard stories about your father my entire life. Are the rumors true? Was it really a spell that went wrong?”
“I won’t talk about that!” she snapped.
Raesh looked away, embarrassed or ashamed—she didn’t know which. She instantly regretted what she’d said and how she’d said it. After all, there was no way he could’ve understood the emotional pain that had she had to endure ever since the accident. Even she could barely understand it, and it was her pain.
“Look. I’m sorry. I’m just really tired. All the trains I’ve been on today, I guess. Can we please just continue this conversation later?”
“Ah, the old ‘later’ ploy, right? How original.”
He laughed. She laughed, too. Neither of them meant it. Raesh turned and headed to the door, and Andie watched and wished there was something she could say to make up for the mood she’d ruined. He really had been great to her, and after the dizzying reception she’d gotten when first arriving in the city, she really needed Raesh’s comforting presence that night. He turned back at the door.
“We don’t need to continue this,” he said. “I can see on your face how much it hurts. We can talk about whatever you want. We don’t ever need to discuss this again.”
He turned to leave and was almost out of the door when she stopped him.
“Raesh. Thank you for sharing with me earlier. About your family and how much you want magic. That was really nice.”
He smiled that warm smile of his and left. Andie sighed and leaned back against the wall. She was alone again with her thoughts. Always alone with her thoughts.
* * *
An hour later she was sitting in bed, preparing to lay down. She’d gotten everything ready for the next day, and there was nothing left except to be anxious and to implant her icon. She wasn’t in a hurry to have the university monitor every move and magical use, but there was no way around it. If she was going to commit to her studies at the University, she had to conform to their rules.
“Here goes my freedom,” she said to herself.
She held the icon in the palm of her hand and took a deep, shuddering breath.
“I, Andie Rogers, of sound mind and spirit do take the oath of the Academy and accept my duties, responsibilities, and limitations as a student of this great body.”
As the final syllable passed her lips, the icon rolled over in her hand and then vanished under her skin in a soft flash of golden light. At first, she didn’t feel anything, even after turning her hand over and making a few fists, but then the cold set in. Then the heat. Together the impossible sensation of hot and cold flowed through her veins to her heart, and from there it was sent through her entire body. She opened her mouth in a silent scream as a violent convulsion made its way from head to toe. The feeling only lasted a moment, though, and it faded with every beat of her heart until she felt perfectly like herself again. She laid back in bed and kicked herself under the covers.
Sleep didn’t come easy, but that was unsurprising, and tonight she had even more on her mind. She tried to suppress the memories of what happened to her mother and her father’s accident. She tried to trust Mirth, the healer who was staying with her father back home. Of course, there was also her new life in the city to consider—this city that didn’t seem as welcoming or as promising as she had hoped. She’d given up trying to see the silver lining in Arvall City after she’d picked up the rest of her books earlier. Thinking of the books made her remember.
She rolled over and reached under the bed to retrieve the bag she’d hidden there earlier. She opened it and then uncovered the secret compartment in the bottom of it. She dropped the bag and opened the book on her lap. It was dusty. From Dragons to Men. A history of dragon-blooded people and their magic. She wanted so badly to flip through it with relish, as she did almost every night, but she had enough on her mind. She closed it and locked it away in the cabinet of the nightstand, and slid the key into her pocket.
She laid down again, trying to block out the blackness of her thoughts. But she couldn’t suppress them and she knew there was only one way that she would be able to get to sleep. She let it all in, all the worry and pain and memories, and once they rooted themselves deep in her mind, she accepted that everything was her fault. After that, the guilt crushed her into sleep.
* * *
She dreamed again. She’d been dreaming the same dream for years and only the way she saw it changed.
It always begins the same.
She’s staring out in front of her, through an odd and exciting haze. Somewhere in the haze, there is a mirror that isn’t clear; she can’t tell if it’s because of the haze or if the mirror itself is somehow. . . wrong. All she knows is that the mirror is really a window—a sight into some other world or other life—and that she must see through somehow. She has to know what’s there to see.
And then a sound. Slight, soft, hardly a sound at all, almost as if it were only made of the most delicate of sounds for certain ears to hear. It was the smallest of echoes.
Over the years, the haze lightened and lifted until finally it subsided. Eventually, she could see a field and a woman standing in the middle of it. Beautiful, majestic, and covered in blood. The woman reached out, maybe to Andie, maybe to the universe, and then fire fell from the sky in terrifying waves of light and flame and brilliant destruction.
The sound cleared as well and revealed itself to be the woman’s voice. Louder and louder it grew. She was screaming. The woman in the field who was drenched in blood, who seemed to be destroying the earth, was screaming for help.
* * *
Andie woke violently, sweating and breathing as if she’d just finished a race. She was shivering, from fear or sweat it didn’t matter. The iridescent pattern on her left arm was burning, as it always did after the dream. She was thankful that she only had the trace in one spot on her body. For now.
Something compelled her to move, to run, to escape the bed and the room and the apartment. A dark energy that shrouded her mind and made her desperate to clear her head. She jumped out of bed and hurried through her small room and into the hallway. She stopped for a quick breath, a moment to clear her mind and realize that the dream was over. That she was safe.
<
br /> She didn’t know what made her run from her room. It could’ve been fear, but she was never one to show herself a coward. It had to be something more and maybe she’d never know until she understood the dream itself. She turned and headed down the stairs. Maybe Marvo was up and could make her some coffee at the restaurant downstairs. At the bottom of the stairs she halted, shocked by the sight.
The restaurant was completely full; people were everywhere, eating, drinking, or waiting for their order. There weren’t even any open chairs. She wondered what they were all doing there so early in the morning until she looked to the front of the place, where the giant panes of glass that made the storefront showed that it was late morning. The sun was already halfway across the sky. Then she heard laughter. She turned and saw Raesh, posted in the corner with a steaming cup, taking a break or slacking off. He was watching her.
“I was just getting ready to come up and wake you. You’re gonna be late.”
Andie’s eyes widened with the realization that she had slept through the night. Without so much of a glance at her watch, she ran out the door into the warm morning light and raced down the cobbled street towards the direction of the University.
Her arm burned and with a mad panic she realized the iridescent glow on her arm was visible. She desperately tugged on her sleeve to cover the evidence, panting from the exertion of her sudden and unexpected sprint. She couldn’t let anyone see. She contemplated turning back to get her jacket and backpack, but her legs propelled her ever forward down the long and winding roads of Arvall City, towards the great walls of the University.
She couldn’t be late and risk expulsion. Not now. Not when she needed answers most.
Chapter Three
Andie couldn’t miss another day. If she missed even one class today she will have blown her shot at learning to control her powers and discover her abilities forever. Nineteen is the oldest age the Academy will accept without a special letter of recommendation, which she had no way of getting, and the first eleven days are the most a student can miss before they forfeit the year. The Academy opens its door on the two hundredth day of each year and today is the Two Hundredth and Twelfth Day. Crunch time.
She raced through the streets toward SKY 6. Without meaning to, her powers manifested in her haste and before she realized it her magic was pushing people aside and creating a clear path for her. She stopped and checked the icon; it was glowing faintly, warning her against using her magic, but as long as she kept it to small things (and nothing too frequently) she would be okay. Realizing she would never make it in time at this pace, she tried hailing a cab, but not a single one stopped.
All at once she was feeling everything—her tardiness, her new life, her anxiety, her hurry, the sights, the sounds, the hard and steady breath of Arvall City—and she felt overwhelmed with the energy and activity.
“So this is what it’s like?” she wondered out loud.
As if in rude answer, someone snatched her bag from her shoulder and ran back the way Andie had just come. Her mind was still lilting above her present, but luckily her body reacted on instinct. She turned and was chasing him down the street, across the intersection, around two corners, and finally into an alley. The thief had been tiring steadily, but growing up in a rural area had bred Andie for this moment. She caught him and threw her weight on him; they both came crashing down, but Andie hit her head on the stone of the alley floor. For a moment, she was dazed and the world swam before her eyes while the thief scrambled to his feet and grabbed her bag again. When he saw that Andie had hit her head, he took a moment to catch his breath. He looked down at her and laughed. That is, until he saw the cut on her head begin to heal. He gasped, dropped the bag, and took off running as if the great dragon Gordric himself were chasing him. He knew what everyone knew: healing is a sign of dragon magic. Andie saw the fear on his face and suddenly only that look mattered to her.
“No, wait!” she screamed.
But he was already gone. She cursed herself, her lack of control, and her dragon blood and hoped he would be frightened enough to keep his mouth shut. She stood up and grabbed her bag, which was still in one piece. Now she had even less time. She turned and started off at a jog, and then she remembered. The icon. She stopped in midstride and checked her palm. Nothing. It was glowing again, warning her, but no alarm was sounded, no searing pain. It was unbelievable. She couldn’t be that lucky. She waited and waited and waited, but nothing happened.
“They must not be able to detect dragon blood,” she mused out loud. “That’s the only explanation.”
After a few more moments of nothing she started walking again. She decided to simply see how it acted on her way to the Academy. She kept her head low and ran.
* * *
Somewhere along her route, after getting lost in the baffling streets of University Park, Andie caught a cab. It dropped her at the train station and she only just managed to board before the doors closed. While she rode the train up the mountain, almost completely vertical, she gathered her books into her bag and fixed herself. All the trains were charmed so that the relative gravity inside the cars didn’t change. Everyone could walk around just as they would on level ground. The train seemed to reach the top faster than it had the day before, but she knew it was only her nerves. Once off the train, she was running again, almost leaping to catch the class that started in two minutes. She began to slow as she got closer to the front doors and then she looked up, just took a good look at that magnificent black marble.
“You going to come in or just stare at the damn thing?” asked a voice beside her.
Andie turned to face a beautiful girl. She had a familiar smile. It took Andie a moment to realize that it was familiar because it reminded her of Raesh.
“Are you Carmen?” Andie asked. “Raesh’s cousin?”
“Guilty,” she said, looking coy as if she knew something she might or might not share. “And you’re the prodigy girl with the dad who spelled himself into an almost vegetative state.”
She shook her head as if watching a kitten try to climb something it can’t understand is too tall. Andie’s jaw dropped a little at Carmen’s complete tactlessness.
“Don’t feel bad, sweetie. This is the city. We’ve all got sad stories here.”
“Do you all say what you’re thinking without any concern for people’s feelings?”
“You’re upset. And you have a right to be. Look, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean any disrespect to you or your father. I barely have the semblance of the filter. The truth is that no one in Vall is going to play by your country rules of hospitality and patience. It just won’t fly here. But for my part I apologize.”
“Thanks,” Andie said, not sure if she was really accepting the apology.
Carmen looked at Andie from head to toe, scanning with intense concentration as if she were x-raying her skeleton. Then she looked at Andie right in her eyes and smiled that beautiful, warm, familiar smile. Andie could tell that even if she was uncouth, she was genuine.
“I really should get going,” Andie said. “My class is starting practically as we speak.”
“Morning classes? Black the stars, girl.”
“What?”
“Black the stars. It means something like ‘I can’t believe it.’”
“Ah. Well, I’ll have to catch up on the language. I’ll see you around.”
“Yes, you will. I’ll be looking out for you. Which is a big deal because it’s not something I would normally do, even for a girl my cousin has a crush on.”
“He doesn’t have a crush on me,” Andie said, looking at her feet and knowing it was untrue.
“Not sure why you said that or which one of us you think is stupid enough to believe it, but he most certainly does and you know it, don’t you?” Carmen asked with a grin. “Just let him down easy.”
With that she pushed Andie through the front doors.
Chapter Four
It was unreal. There wasn’t a single dream or mental
picture or sprawling fantasy that could capture what Andie saw when she crossed the threshold. She never expected it to be that. Beautiful. The ceilings, walls, and floors were made of the same black marble as the outside. The doors and fixtures were all made of solid gold. The light, if it could be called that—almost looked like an ethereal glow bleeding from the very marble itself. It was magical, transformative; it lit the halls and the rooms like no regular light could. While outside the marble was still, the way it should be, inside the floors and ceiling seemed to be moving. It was incredible. Once they reached the end of the entrance hallway the ceiling disappeared into an endless black void. They had passed into the heart of the mountain. Flying over their heads were hundreds, maybe thousands of tiny yellow creatures zipping back and forth as if they were on a mission.
“Mountain Faeries,” Carmen said. “Think of them as little messengers. They handle all correspondence inside the University.”
“Fitting, I guess. They never lie, right?”
“Correct. Pretentious little self-righteous snitches if you ask me. That endlessness above us is where you go if you use too much magic outside of school. I’m not sure what happens up there, but I hope I never find out.”
They walked on and Andie began to notice just how many students there were. Thousands upon thousands. They were everywhere. Some had skin in hues and tones she she’d never ever seen before and some, she figured from the north, were so pale they were almost transparent. They were speaking all kinds of different languages, some of which she’d come into contact with before, but most of which she couldn’t even begin to decipher.
“How many students are there?” she asked.
“Five, six hundred thousand. Who knows? More just keep coming. That’s SKY 1, the faculty train. It runs up to their rent-free homes a little higher up the mountain.”